The longer the time, the harder it is … be vigilant

Hello again to you all. I trust that everyone of us is continuing to maintain our discipline. The longer the time, the harder it is I’m sure, but it is still very necessary to be vigilant…

…During this week, please think about and pray for those very many people doing their best to maintain the disciplines of self-isolating, and/or of social distancing in spite of the very difficult and challenging conditions of their home and family life. We are very fortunate to live where we do, and whilst ‘lockdown’ is an inconvenience, we have the compensation of being able to enjoy wide open spaces, spacious gardens, well appointed homes, and generally speaking a comfortable existence. For many others, it is not like this. Pray especially for those living in cramped conditions, those with no access to gardens or green spaces, those who have little money for food, those whose relationships are under stress; for those with children who have to be kept entertained, those caring for dependant relatives, those living alone…

…I am conscious that it is not easy to keep contact easily. And so, if you would like me to call on you for a chat either over the front gate, on the door step, through the window, or even in the garden – properly distanced of course – I would be very pleased to do just that. Just let me know and we arrange a day and time to suit both of us. I am enjoying the opportunity to walk around and about so it would be no hardship to me…not even a short car journey if necessary…

…In the Church’s calendar we are entering into that time between Easter and Pentecost, that period of time during which Jesus appeared alive after His death on several occasions. It is very easy for us at a time like this to imagine that God is absent from us; that somehow or another it is as if God has abandoned us to our fate. While it is true that we will never ‘see’ Jesus in the way He was seen during those 40 days, nevertheless we are promised that God is with us wherever we are, whatever our circumstances. Perhaps at this time, more than ever, rather than searching for the answer to the question, ‘where is God’, better to trust that the God who revealed Himself in the person of the risen Christ is with us today.

As the Psalmist mused ‘I lift up mine eyes to the hills…Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord who made Heaven and earth…The Lord will guard us as we come and go, now and for evermore’ (Psalm 121)…

…In that Spirit, may we all be strengthened, continue to keep ourselves safe, and rest easy in the company of the ever-present God…

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Bible verse of the day

And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.